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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24135553">Found</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/bewaretheboojum/pseuds/bewaretheboojum'>bewaretheboojum</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Learning to Adapt [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Red Robin (Comics), Robin (Comics), Superboy (Comics), Young Justice (Comics)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Future, Angst, Fluff, Future Fic, Kid Fic, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 17:27:15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,672</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24135553</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/bewaretheboojum/pseuds/bewaretheboojum</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>AU - Future Fic - Written for Tim/Kon Week 2020 Prompt 2 - Angst</p>
<p>Tim and Kon have taken on the mantle of Batman and Superman and things between them, both in and out of uniform, have settled into something close to normal. Then Tim gets wind that Luthor is back in the business of cloning. Tim tries hard to look into the matter while keeping Kon in the dark, but when he finally infiltrates Luthor's lab, he finds something he doesn't expect.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Tim Drake/Kon-El | Conner Kent</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Learning to Adapt [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1741612</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>74</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>TimKon Week</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Found</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Kon woke to Tim slipping into his bed. It was either very late or very early, but the lights and brightly colored signs in Metropolis kept the city from ever actually being dark. Shadows from his curtains darkened Kon's room and the most he could see of Tim was the pale splash of the skin as he slipped under the sheets.</p>
<p>Tim had, as usual, made his way to Kon's place after his nightly patrol in Gotham City.  It had been nearly two years since Tim had taken over as Batman. While things could get rocky sometimes, usually because of Bruce pushing Tim more than Kon thought was strictly necessary, the two of them handled things pretty well.</p>
<p>Tim usually tried to leave the stress of patrol back at the Cave, but tonight...</p>
<p>Kon could tell from the rigidity of Tim’s spine that, tonight, something was still clearly on his mind.</p>
<p>"Hey, you okay?" Kon asked, sleepily running what he hoped was a soothing hand down the line of Tim's back as he settled more comfortably against Kon.</p>
<p>Kon could feel the tension along the length of Tim's body. His muscles were tight and there was a stiffness to his neck that always indicated he was thinking about something way more than he should be.</p>
<p>Tim hummed thoughtfully and nodded his head before pressing his face against Kon's bare shoulder.</p>
<p>"I'm fine. I'm sorry I woke you."</p>
<p>"It wasn't so much you coming in that woke me. I think it was more the sheer force of your feverish thinking projecting out into my apartment like a creepy thought ghost."</p>
<p>Tim huffed out a brief laugh in the darkness of the room and shook his head.</p>
<p>"New Rule: You're not allowed to have any more Horror Movie Marathons with Cassie and Bart while I'm out Batmaning."</p>
<p>"Mmmmm, veto. I think the new rule should be that you need to spend more time doing Horror Movie Marathons with me, Bart, and Cassie and less time Batmaning."</p>
<p>"Your new rule will be taken under advisement but no guarantees can be made at this time…”</p>
<p>"Rao, help us," Kon said plaintively and Tim snorted another laugh.</p>
<p>"But for real, are you okay? Rough night in Gotham today? Joker pop up somewhere? I know Bruce prefers us not to be there, but you know Bart, Cassie and I will come in a heartbeat if you need back up..."</p>
<p>"I don't need--"</p>
<p>"You've been working a lot. More than usual. You know that when you take on too much, you get exhausted. That's when I worry the most."</p>
<p>Kon reached down a hand to cup at Tim's chin. He tilted Tim's head back so he could see the glint of his blue eyes in the darkened bedroom.</p>
<p>Tim stilled in Kon's arms then, barely breathing before answering in a soft tone of voice.</p>
<p>"It's nothing like that. Don't worry about it. I just have a few more things I need to take care of. In a couple of days, I'll be done with it and everything will go back to normal."</p>
<p>"Promise?" Kon pressed.</p>
<p>"God, I hope so.”</p>
<p>Tim rocked up and pressed a kiss to Kon's lips as if to seal his promise.</p>
<p>As Kon drifted back to sleep, he could feel Tim beside him, still tense and very much awake.</p>
<p>^*^*^*^*^</p>
<p>*Come home soon. The Horror Movie Marathon of Horrors has nearly ended! What time will you be back? I'll make sure I'm home to meet you.*</p>
<p>Tim smiled as he read the text from Kon and looked at the accompanying picture. It was an image of Cassie, Kon, and Bart. They had their arms around each other and were grinning into the camera. They were all wearing ridiculous pajamas and Cassie had her hair pulled up into pigtails.</p>
<p>*Just a couple more hours. I'll be back around 1 am tonight, maybe.* Tim texted back before tucking his phone back into the pouch in his belt.</p>
<p>Taking a deep breath, Tim refocused his attention to the building he was surveilling. He tried his best to stick to the shadows along the wall of a large office building in Metropolis' downtown business district. Though all the lights in this damn city didn’t make it easy.</p>
<p>The area was mostly deserted this time of night with the exception of the crack security team that Luthor had assigned to the building. Tim had been watching this area for weeks. Mostly via cameras he had set up but sometimes he hovered around the surrounding rooftops.</p>
<p>After everything that had happened with Kon, Tim made it a habit to closely monitor Luthor at all times. Just in case When his algorithms pulled out a pattern in deliveries to this lab that indicated that Luthor may have restarted his cloning experiments, Tim had upped his level of attention.</p>
<p>Keeping tabs on the building without letting Kon know had been hard.  He was spending more and more time patrolling Metropolis and Tim had been agonizing for days whether or not he needed to tell Kon what was going on.</p>
<p>But...</p>
<p>But the last thing Tim wanted to do was tell Kon and have him insist on helping with the raid and the takedown. Kon didn't need to see dozens of decanters of failed clones in Luthor's facilities. Dealing with Match and all the others had been hard enough for Kon. It had taken a toll on him in ways that Tim didn't like to think back on.</p>
<p>Tim's goal was to get into Luthor's facilities before the experiments went too far, destroy any stores of DNA Luthor had somehow accumulated again and then make it clear to Luthor that this behavior had to stop or Tim would take more decisive action.</p>
<p>From the pattern of the shipments, Luthor could only have been at this for a few months now, so any progress would be minimal. Tim was hoping to shut the whole thing down before Luthor actually made any substantial progress on the clones. </p>
<p>Breaking into the building was a little harder than Tim had expected. While he had always been pretty good at breaking and entering, Luthor was clearly trying to be careful. Tim hacked into the security systems, disabled the cameras and made the video from the last hour loop. Then he worked quickly to find the stairway leading down to the subterranean laboratory Luthor was using for his top-secret cloning facilities.</p>
<p>The labs were dark this time of night and eerily quiet. The hum of refrigeration units keeping samples and supplies cold was the only sound as Tim slipped in. A sickening sense of deja vu washed over him as he looked at a series of oversized empty decanters lining one wall. Tim deliberately looked away from them. </p>
<p>Large lab benches held equipment and machinery, the function of which Tim didn't want to think about too much. There were a couple of computers, some storage boxes and several stands holding vials of samples. A pipette was scattered with a couple of pens and some post it notes across one bench.</p>
<p>Heading over to a bank of computers, Tim booted one up and slipped a USB drive into one of the ports. The drive would search Luthor's computer network and remove all trace of any information regarding experiments relating to cloning. Leaving the USB to do its work, Tim moved off through the rest of the lab.</p>
<p>Tim used a small device to create a power surge in the electronics that were on the lab benches. He was unplugging all the refrigerators and liberating some of Kon’s DNA samples when he heard a soft sound coming from behind a door off to his left.</p>
<p>Tim stilled, sudden fear shooting through him. While Tim had hacked into the security logs before he broke in and made sure all the people who usually worked in his lab had left for the day, he hadn't actually checked all the anterooms for scientists working late. </p>
<p>Swallowing hard, Tim quietly made his way to the door and listened carefully. The sound behind the door was muffled, clearly the room was sound-proofed. Though the noises coming from the other side were soft and muted, they sounded human and...</p>
<p>Distressed.</p>
<p>Not hesitating for another minute, Tim tried to open the door. When the knob wouldn't turn, Tim puffed out a breath of frustration. Working fast, he pulled the hinges off the door and tugged it open the wrong way. The second there was a crack between the door and the frame the sound came tumbling out.</p>
<p>It was a crying child.</p>
<p>Tim felt his heart start to pound in his chest and pulled hard at the door, tugging it open just wide enough for him to slip through.</p>
<p>The room he found inside was sterile. Totally devoid of color. There was a small child in the center of the room, maybe four or five months old, wearing just a diaper. The child was standing up in a stark white pen, tears running down their face. The child had a shock of dark hair and large, blue eyes that...</p>
<p>That looked just like Kon's.</p>
<p>Tim swallowed hard and rushed over to the child, alone and crying in the dark. He scooped them up into his arms and tried to comfort them. A small, strong hand reached up to grab at Tim's cheek and he swallowed hard around a lump in his throat.</p>
<p>"Shhhh, it's ok sweetie. You're safe now. Everything is going to be ok. I'm going to get you out of here," Tim promised.</p>
<p>And he did. As fast as he could possibly manage.</p>
<p>^*^*^*^*^</p>
<p>The lights were on in Kon's apartment when he got home. He hadn't been expecting that. </p>
<p>While Tim had said he would be home by one, Kon hadn’t really believed him. He hadn't been home before four in the morning in close to a month. So Kon had felt comfortable staying out late to watch movies with Bart and Cassie.</p>
<p>When Kon closed the door to his apartment and locked it behind him, he could hear Tim in the other room, speaking softly to someone. Assuming Tim was on the phone, Kon tried to stay quiet as he made his way back to the living room.</p>
<p>That's where he found Tim.</p>
<p>Tim wasn't, in fact, on the phone. He was standing, half out of his uniform, holding a small baby. The child had dark hair and was giggling up at Tim, adoringly. Tim had the baby wrapped in one of the throw blankets from the sofa that Harper had knitted for them a few years back. Krypto was standing next to them, looking up the child curiously.</p>
<p>"Tim?"</p>
<p>Tim whirled to face Kon, his expression surprised and concerned. His shoulders were tense and his eyes were lined with worry. His mouth was pressed into a thin line and he held the baby even closer to his chest.</p>
<p>The baby, for its part, reached out a chubby little hand and patted at Tim's chin.</p>
<p>Tim looked down at the child and gave them a small smile before turning back to face Kon.</p>
<p>"Hey," Tim said lamely.</p>
<p>"You have a baby..."</p>
<p>"Yeah..." Tim ventured slowly. "My sister is stopping somewhere to get her some clothes and fresh diapers."</p>
<p>"Which sister?" Kon asked.</p>
<p>"Cass."</p>
<p>"Of course. Where did the baby come from?" Kon asked, stepping in close to Tim and looking down at the little girl.</p>
<p>She was very tiny but she smiled up at Kon, not the least bit afraid of the new strange man who was suddenly very close to her.</p>
<p>Tim took a deep shaky breath and sat down on the sofa. Kon settled in next to him as Krypto laid down at their feet, keeping a close eye on the baby.</p>
<p>"Ummm, that's actually a long story," Tim said, and his voice was more tremulous and nervous than Kon had ever heard it before.</p>
<p>"We've got time..." Kon said, reaching out a finger to the baby.</p>
<p>"Go... go wash your hands first. Before you touch her..."</p>
<p>Kon huffed out a laugh and went to wash up. Tim being protective of the baby was way cuter than Kon could have ever expected. As he scrubbed his hands, he remembered the soft, gentle expression on Tim's face when he first saw him with the little girl. He had looked so...</p>
<p>Kon didn't know how to describe it aside from calling it a strange combination of relaxed, happy, and protective all rolled into one. It was a good look on Tim.</p>
<p>As Kon made his way back down the hallway to the living room he heard Tim talking to the baby again but...</p>
<p>Kon realized, with a sudden jolt that Tim wasn't speaking English to the baby. He was talking to her in Kryptonian.</p>
<p>A sudden worry washed through Kon and rushed back into the living room. Tim looked up at him and the little girl cooed a hello and waved a floppy arm at him.</p>
<p>"Tim..." Kon started but broke off when Tim let out a low sigh and gestured to Kon to sit down.</p>
<p>Then, Tim told him everything. He explained to Kon about how he kept an eye on Luthor and about how he raided the lab. A chill ran down Kon’s spine as he described destroying DNA samples with his name on them. And when he told Kon about finding the baby and  how alone she had been and how she clung to Tim when he found her. He choked up when he told Kon about how he couldn't leave her there. About how he had to take her. How they had to protect her.</p>
<p>When he was done telling Kon all of this there were tears in Tim's eyes. He bit his lip as he looked directly into Kon's eyes.</p>
<p>"I couldn't leave her there. She's part of you and I couldn't just let him... I won't let him hurt her the same way he hurt you. I won't let him--"</p>
<p>Kon's own throat was tight and all he could think to do in that moment was to wrap his arms around both Tim and the child and pull them close.</p>
<p>"Thank you," Kon husked, pressing his face into the hair at the top of Tim's head. "Thank you for finding her."</p>
<p>Kon tried hard not to remember back to his time in the lab. He had worked to forget what it had been like, how cold and lonely it had been at night. The thought of a child so young and so small there by herself...</p>
<p>Swallowing hard around a lump in his throat, he looked down at the small girl. She was tucked between the two of them, and when she saw his attention shift to her, she reached up a chubby little hand to tug at Kon's beard.</p>
<p>Kon let out a tearful laugh and smiled down at her.</p>
<p>"Or should I be thanking you, huh?" he asked her. "Maybe it was you who found him."</p>
<p>She giggled up at him and smiled widely.</p>
<p>"I think we found each other," Tim said holding the child close.</p>
<p>"You might be right," Kon said. "She looks like she inherited the renowned  El intelligence."</p>
<p>"Rao help us all," Tim teased.</p>
<p>When Cass arrived, she didn't just have clothes and diapers. Cass also brought a small crib, food, and a stuffed bunny wearing a pink ballerina outfit that was almost as big as the baby.</p>
<p>It was Kon who started calling her Aonah that night, the Kryptonian word for 'daughter'.</p>
<p>It was Cass who started calling her Al, complaining that Aonah-El had way too many vowels for her to deal with at three in the morning.</p>
<p>Both names stuck.</p>
<p>Kon was, unusually, the last to fall asleep that night. He wanted to stay awake as long as possible to listen to the slow even breathing of Tim and Al as they both slept deeply for the first time in what was probably weeks.</p>
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